§ SIR CHARLES DOUGLASsaid, he would beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, If he has received any communication from the magistrates of the Middleton Cheney Petty Sessions relative to the committal of two men for three months who were unable to pay a fine of 30s. for being drunk and riotous in a public thoroughfare?
§ SIR GEORGE GREY,in reply, said, it was quite clear that the magistrates were under the impression that the hon. Member had imputed to them a violation of the law. No doubt the letter of the law sanctioned the course which the magistrates had adopted. Under what was called Jervis's Act they had the power, where a penalty was imposed and there were no means of distress, of committing for any term, not exceeding three months' in default of payment. In the two eases brought before them the men had been previously convicted. The magistrates believed they had the means of paying the penalty, and in fact one of them paid the penalty within four days, and was then discharged. It was in the discretion of the magistrates to impose a penalty, but he thought that the spirit of the Act would be contravened if a penalty were imposed which it was known could not be paid, merely for the purpose of subjecting parties to imprisonment. It was clear that such was not the case in the present instance.